European officials appeared to be at odds today over whether to release stress test results earlier than planned and reveal banks' exposure to sovereign debt.
The confusion over the timing adds to weeks of uncertainty and rumours about the tests, seen as key to show how banks would cope with another economic slump and losses on government debt after the Greek crisis raised fears of a euro zone crunch.
French and German supervisors are among those pushing to bring forward the release of the results of a health check of 91 banks to give European markets a chance to react rather than leave the first judgment to US markets, four people familiar with the discussions said.
But Britain's financial regulator said it still expected to publish results after 4pm tomorrow - in line with the original timetable - and the Bank of Spain said it would present its findings at 4.30pm tomorrow as planned.
"It would be reasonable to bring it forward to the morning," one of the informed people said. A decision is due in a conference call of European finance ministry officials scheduled for later today, the people said.
The officials will also discuss whether to persuade banks to give a detailed breakdown of their government debt holdings, which would be a show of transparency that investors and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have asked for.
A document by the Committee of European Banking Supervisors, the group presiding over the stress test, includes a template for the release of government bond holdings but leaves open whether publication is mandatory.
With few details available about the terms of the test and early divisions among the 27 European Union members over how much information to divulge, investors have worried the assessments would not be tough or transparent enough.
"It has to be the right sort of test, it is absolutely crucial," said Ted Scott , director of UK strategy at fund management house F&C. "If the criteria are insufficiently rigorous it will undermine confidence rather than increase it."